Recent literature demonstrates the contribution of short food supply chains to regional economies and sustainable food systems, and acknowledges their role as drivers for sustainable development. Moreover, different types of SFSC have been supported by urban food policies over the few last years and actors from the food chain became part of new institutional settings for urban food policies. However, evidence from the sustainability impact assessment of these SFSC in urban contexts is limited. Our paper presents an approach for the (...) development of an SIA framework for different SFSC types. In addition, a practical application of the tool in four metropolitan regions is tested. The conceptual development of the SIA framework is based on an in-depth analysis of existing SIA frameworks and methods for assessing the sustainability of agriculture, food chains and food systems and adapted to the specific needs of analysing SFSC in metropolitan regions. The operational value and utility of the framework and the tool were tested with social and natural scientists and local stakeholders. The assessment results demonstrate that SFSC seems to be more sustainable than the baseline in the social dimension, but also feature specific strengths and weaknesses concerning their economic and environmental sustainability. This might give an indication for regional adjusted strategies and food chain innovations that improve the sustainability performance may be required. We found the tool useful for framing the dialogue between food chain actors, consumers and policy, because it makes benefits and trade-offs of the chain types operating in an urban–rural context more visible and communicable. (shrink)

The domain of numbers provides a paradigmatic case for investigating interactions of culture, language, and cognition: Numerical competencies are considered a core domain of knowledge, and yet the development of specifically human abilities presupposes cultural and linguistic input by way of counting sequences. These sequences constitute systems with distinct structural properties, the cross-linguistic variability of which has implications for number representation and processing. Such representational effects are scrutinized for two types of verbal numeration systems—general and object-specific ones—that were in parallel (...) use in several Oceanic languages. The analysis indicates that the object-specific systems outperform the general systems with respect to counting and mental arithmetic, largely due to their regular and more compact representation. What these findings reveal on cognitive diversity, how the conjectures involved speak to more general issues in cognitive science, and how the approach taken here might help to bridge the gap between anthropology and other cognitive sciences is discussed in the conclusion. (shrink)

This paper reassesses the domain of the business ethics curriculum and, drawing on recent shifts in the business environment, maps out some suggestions for extending the core ground of the discipline. It starts by assessing the key elements of the dominant English- language business ethics textbooks and identifying the domain as reflected by those publications as where the law ends and beyond the legal minimum. Based on this, the paper identifies potential gaps and new areas for the discipline by drawing (...) on four main aspects. First, it argues that the domain of business ethics requires extensions dependent on the particular geographic region where the subject is taught. A second factor for broadening the scope is the impact of recent scandals, which arguably direct the focus of ethical inquiry towards the nature of the business systems in which individuals and corporations operate. Third, the impact of globalization and its result on growing corporate involvement in regulatory processes is discussed. Fourth and finally, business ethics reaches beyond the traditional constituencies of economic stakeholders as new actors from civil society enter the stage of ethical decision making in business. We conclude by suggesting that a reconsideration of the domain of business ethics, especially in Europe, is timely, but that to do so represents a major challenge to business ethics educators. (shrink)

This paper reassesses the domain of the business ethics curriculum and, drawing on recent shifts in the business environment, maps out some suggestions for extending the core ground of the discipline. It starts by assessing the key elements of the dominant English-language business ethics textbooks and identifying the domain as reflected by those publications as 'where the law ends' and 'beyond the legal minimum'. Based on this, the paper identifies potential gaps and new areas for the discipline by drawing on (...) four main aspects. First, it argues that the domain of business ethics requires extensions dependent on the particular geographic region where the subject is taught. A second factor for broadening the scope is the impact of recent scandals, which arguably direct the focus of ethical inquiry towards the nature of the business systems in which individuals and corporations operate. Third, the impact of globalization and its result on growing corporate involvement in regulatory processes is discussed. Fourth and finally, business ethics reaches beyond the traditional constituencies of 'economic stakeholders' as new actors from civil society enter the stage of ethical decision making in business. We conclude by suggesting that a reconsideration of the domain of business ethics, especially in Europe, is timely, but that to do so represents a major challenge to business ethics educators. (shrink)

Via a historical reconstruction, this paper primarily demonstrates how the societal debate on genetically modified organisms (GMOs) gradually extended in terms of actors involved and concerns reflected. It is argued that the implementation of recombinant DNA technology out of the laboratory and into civil society entailed a “complex of concerns.” In this complex, distinctions between environmental, agricultural, socio-economic, and ethical issues proved to be blurred. This fueled the confusion between the wider debate on genetic modification and the risk assessment of (...) transgenic crops in the European Union. In this paper, the lasting skeptical and/or ambivalent attitude of Europeans towards agro-food biotechnology is interpreted as signaling an ongoing social request – and even a quest – for an evaluation of biotechnology with Sense and Sensibility. In this (re)quest, a broader-than-scientific dimension is sought for that allows addressing the GMO debate in a more “sensible” way, whilst making “sense” of the different stances taken in it. Here, the restyling of the European regulatory frame on transgenic agro-food products and of science communication models are discussed and taken to be indicative of the (re)quest to move from a merely scientific evaluation and risk-based policy towards a socially more robust evaluation that takes the “non-scientific” concerns at stake in the GMO debate seriously. (shrink)

ABSTRACTDot-probe studies usually find an attentional bias towards threatening stimuli only in anxious participants, but not in non-anxious participants. In the present study, we conducted two experiments to investigate whether attentional bias towards angry faces in unselected samples is moderated by the extent to which the current task requires social processing. In Experiment 1, participants performed a dot-probe task involving classification of either socially meaningful targets or meaningless targets. Targets were preceded by two photographic face cues, one angry and one (...) neutral. Angry face cues only produced significant cueing scores with socially meaningful targets, not with meaningless targets. In Experiment 2, participants classified only meaningful targets, which were either socially meaningful or not. Again, mean cue... (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reviewed by:The Rhetorical Sense of Philosophy by Donald Phillip VereneJeffrey Dirk WilsonVERENE, Donald Phillip. The Rhetorical Sense of Philosophy. Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University Press, 2021. xiii + 139 pp. Cloth, $49.95Rhetoric gives philosophy the ability to speak. Philosophy gives rhetoric something to say. They are mutually indispensable, and their rivalry at times descends into enmity. There are also occasions when only the one can rescue the other from (...) catastrophe. Those are the overarching dynamics of Verene's book.There is an introduction, then two parts, "Prolegomena Philosophiae," comprising four chapters, and "Three Rhetorics," comprising three chapters, followed by an epilogue, notes, and an index.Though Verene does not mention Hume in the introduction—and only twice in the book otherwise—it is difficult not to think of him when Verene speaks of philosophy as "a theater of memory," as if correcting Hume's "theater of the mind." It is also corrective to presentism, often attributed to Hume, when Verene claims that a chief task of the philosopher "is to keep us from always living in the present. For this labor to be accomplished the philosopher must go to school with both the poets and the orators." Rhetoric, rightly understood, helps philosophy to remain philosophy and prevents it from becoming sophistry.In chapter 1, "Philosophical Thinking," Verene reminds the reader that mortality is not a choice. The bounded nature of human life leads to the pursuit of happiness and, therefore, also to the pursuit of meaning. The human responds in two ways, by creating both arguments and stories, but arguments as well as stories need words.The "and yet" comes in the second chapter, "Philosophy and the Muses." Verene writes, "The philosopher knows that the real always outstrips language." Philosophy and its kin, poetry, point beyond themselves. Writing is remembering, but what is written, even at its best, can never capture all that is remembered, and memory, even at its best, can never capture all that is.In "Philosophy and Eloquence," Verene maps a way of escaping Kant. Modern philosophy rejects rhetoric and memory in its pursuit of novelty as progress. Verene introduces the concept of ingenium, "a power philosophy shares with rhetoric." It "is the ability to perceive similarity in dissimilars.... the power to produce metaphor" and irony. Metaphor and irony are philosophy's response to the stale univocal predication of critical thinking that Verene sees as the reduction of reality to an analytic concept.In "Philosophical Style," he shows that as soon as a subject is joined to a predicate, the subject ceases to be only what it was. The predicate is an [End Page 369] otherness that is pulled into the subject such that ever after the subject has an inner dialectic. "The ball is red" is generative of a ball that is not merely a ball but also something else, something foreign to its ballness. The ball gives up nothing of what it was but, rather, gains something that it was not, and yet not in the deterministic way of necessity. The ball does not have to be red, but if it is red, then "ball" and "red" constitute an inner dialectic. The ball is red predicatively and not tautologically, but separating out the kinds of predication does not exhaust all the mystery of the inner dialectic; nothing can.The three rhetorics are of "Self-Discourse," "Absolute Thought," and "The Philosophical Frontispiece." These are chapters respectively about speech appertaining to man, God, and the political entity, though each considered slant rather than head-on.Verene juxtaposes Descartes and Vico with respect to self-discourse. Descartes reframes the human being in terms of the first-person singular pronoun, thereby transforming the personal into the categorical. Vico responds by writing not an "autobiography" but, rather, The Life of Giambattista Vico Written by Himself, thereby transforming the pronoun for the other, "he," into the self-identifier. There follows an essay on the essay and especially on the essays of Montaigne as autobiography. "To think," Verene writes, "is to move ideas in relation to each other and thus to illuminate what comes before the mind in experience." What emerges is a dialectic between the "I" and... (shrink)

In their recent paper on “Challenges in mathematical cognition”, Alcock and colleagues (Alcock et al. [2016]. Challenges in mathematical cognition: A collaboratively-derived research agenda. Journal of Numerical Cognition, 2, 20-41) defined a research agenda through 26 specific research questions. An important dimension of mathematical cognition almost completely absent from their discussion is the cultural constitution of mathematical cognition. Spanning work from a broad range of disciplines – including anthropology, archaeology, cognitive science, history of science, linguistics, philosophy, and psychology – we (...) argue that for any research agenda on mathematical cognition the cultural dimension is indispensable, and we propose a set of exemplary research questions related to it. (shrink)

Ein Ziel der Neuregelungen der Insolvenzordnung war es, die Anfechtungsmöglichkeiten auszuweiten. Zugunsten der Gläubiger sollten im Rahmen der neuen Ordnungsfunktion des Insolvenzrechts vermehrt Ansprüche zur Masse gezogen werden, die von den Insolvenzverwaltern gerichtlich durchgesetzt werden müssen. Wegen unzulänglicher Massen sind die Insolvenzverwalter, wie auch bereits zu Zeiten der Konkursordnung, jedoch meist auf eine Fremdfinanzierung angewiesen: Entweder durch staatliche Prozesskostenhilfe oder mit Hilfe der Finanzierungsbereitschaft von Insolvenzgläubigern. Da beide Finanzierungsmöglichkeiten in der Praxis eher theoretischer Natur sind, blieb den Insolvenzverwaltern oftmals nur (...) noch die Möglichkeit, das Klageverfahren auf eigene Kosten und eigenes Risiko zu führen und damit in unzulässiger Weise privates Vermögen mit dem Insolvenzverfahren zu verbinden. Seit der Jahrtausendwende haben sich nun gewerbliche Prozessfinanzierer auf dem Markt etabliert und stellen für Insolvenzverwalter eine sinnvolle Finanzierungsalternative dar. Die vorliegende Arbeit befasst sich mit den Problemen, die sich im Zusammenspiel des Insolvenzverwalters mit der gewerblichen Prozessfinanzierung und der staatlichen Prozesskostenhilfe ergeben. Sie soll all denjenigen Verfahrensbeteiligten eine sinnvolle Hilfe sein, die in der täglichen Praxis mit den aufgezeigten Problemen konfrontiert werden. (shrink)

When making an assessment of animal welfare, it is important to take environmental (housing) or animal-based parameters into account. An alternative approach is to focus on the behavior and appearance of the animal, without making actual measurements or quantifying this. None of these tell the whole story. In this paper, we suggest that it is possible to find common ground between these (seemingly) diametrically opposed positions and argue that this may be the way to deal with the complexity of animal (...) welfare. The model will have to be acceptable for the different parties that will be affected by it and real benefits for the animal should result from it. This will be the basis of a practical ethical approach. All this can be condensed into a model that essentially is made up out of three basic elements: the classical welfare analysis with an existing welfare assessment tool, an assessment of the stockholder, and an implementation of the Free Choice Profiling technique. This new framework does not pretend to be a different or better animal welfare matrix; it is intended to integrate existing knowledge and to provide a practical tool to improve animal welfare. It identifies whether there are welfare problems on a farm, if present whether these problems are caused by the housing system or the stockholder, and what can be done to improve the situation. (shrink)

This article addresses the difficulties that the phases of economic evaluations give rise to in theory and practice. It provides a brief outline of the meaning of economism — as a term and a concept — and then explores the issues that are related to the measurement and monetary valuation of the items to be included in economic evaluations, otherwise known as the valuation problem. The article also deals with the commensurability problem and the intrinsic value problem. Finally, some of (...) alternatives and recommendations that can help avoid the pitfalls of economism are discussed. (shrink)

When making an assessment of animal welfare, it is important to take environmental (housing) or animal-based parameters into account. An alternative approach is to focus on the behavior and appearance of the animal, without making actual measurements or quantifying this. None of these tell the whole story. In this paper, we suggest that it is possible to find common ground between these (seemingly) diametrically opposed positions and argue that this may be the way to deal with the complexity of animal (...) welfare. The model will have to be acceptable for the different parties that will be affected by it and real benefits for the animal should result from it. This will be the basis of a practical ethical approach. All this can be condensed into a model that essentially is made up out of three basic elements: the classical welfare analysis with an existing welfare assessment tool, an assessment of the stockholder, and an implementation of the Free Choice Profiling technique. This new framework does not pretend to be a different or better animal welfare matrix; it is intended to integrate existing knowledge and to provide a practical tool to improve animal welfare. It identifies whether there are welfare problems on a farm, if present whether these problems are caused by the housing system or the stockholder, and what can be done to improve the situation. (shrink)

This paper presents scientists’ understanding of their roles in society and corresponding responsibilities. It discusses the researchers’ perspective against the background of the contemporary literature on scientific responsibility in the social sciences and philosophy and proposes a heuristic that improves the understanding of the complexity of scientific responsibility. The study is based on qualitative interviews with senior scientists. The presented results show what researchers themselves see as their responsibilities, how they assume them, and what challenges they perceive with respect to (...) their responsibilities. Regarding the latter, the interviewed researchers highlight those aspects of responsibility that go beyond the expertise of their professional role, and thus cannot be carried by scientists alone. For example, scientists alone cannot determine the general direction science takes, or the useful application of their research. The interviewed researchers describe those challenges as responsibilities that must be shared across different societal groups. In the theoretical literature, responsibility has been described as a relation between an actor (who), the action for which someone is responsible (what), and the normative framework against which someone is responsible (why). We will draw on this concept of “relational responsibility” to identify the various actors, normative frameworks, and actions relevant to scientific responsibility. This will serve as a heuristic tool to help identify the entanglement of responsibilities spread across several societal groups. (shrink)

This article describes a process of developing, implementing and evaluating a clinical ethics support service intervention with the goal of building up a context-sensitive structure of minimal clinical-ethics in an oncology department without prior clinical ethics structure. Scholars from different disciplines have called for an improvement in the evaluation of clinical ethics support services for different reasons over several decades. However, while a lot has been said about the concepts and methodological challenges of evaluating CESS up to the present time, (...) relatively few empirical studies have been carried out. The aim of this article is twofold. On the one hand, it describes a process of development, modifying and evaluating a CESS intervention as part of the ETHICO research project, using the approach of qualitative-formative evaluation. On the other hand, it provides a methodological analysis which specifies the contribution of qualitative empirical methods to the evaluation of CESS. We conclude with a consideration of the strengths and limitations of qualitative evaluation research with regards to the evaluation and development of context sensitive CESS. We further discuss our own approach in contrast to rather traditional consult or committee models. (shrink)

ZusammenfassungDie öffentliche Diskussion um die „personalisierte Medizin“ legt nahe, dass mit diesem medizinischen Ansatz hohe Erwartungen an einen Beitrag zur klinischen Versorgung verbunden werden. Über die Wahrnehmungen und Bewertungen klinisch tätiger Ärzte ist jedoch wenig bekannt. Die vorliegende qualitative Interviewstudie gibt einen Einblick bezüglich des Einflusses „personalisierter Medizin“ auf die klinische Praxis aus ärztlicher Perspektive. Die Ärzte im vorliegenden Sample nehmen „personalisierte Medizin“ zwar als einen medizinischen Fortschritt wahr, sehen allerdings keine grundsätzliche Veränderung der bisherigen medizinischen Praxis. Als zentrales Problem (...) wird die Handhabung und Verwertung von molekulargenetischen Informationen für Diagnose und Therapie in der klinischen Praxis thematisiert. In Anbetracht der Ergebnisse muss infrage gestellt werden, ob „personalisierte Medizin“ nicht das Gegenteil von dem, was ihr Name nahe legt – eine personenorientiertere Medizin – bewirkt. Die Strategien im Umgang mit den Informationsmassen produzieren selbst neue Herausforderungen, die ein Hindernis für eine personenorientierte Medizin darstellen könnten. (shrink)

We show that it is impossible in quantum mechanics to describe two separated physical systems. This is due to the mathematical structure of quantum mechanics. It is possible to give a description of two separated systems in a theory which is a generalization of quantum mechanics and of classical mechanics, in the sense that this theory contains both theories as special cases. We identify the axioms of quantum mechanics that make it impossible to describe separated systems. One of these axioms (...) is equivalent to the superposition principle. We show how these findings throw a different light on the paradox of Einstein, Podolsky, and Rosen. (shrink)

The practice of ‘Philosophical Counselling’ (henceforth ‘PC’) is growing. But what exactly is PC? The variety of attempts to define PC can be summarised in terms of three overlapping sets of opposites: practical versus theoretical definitions; monistic versus pluralistic definitions; and substantive versus antinomous definitions. ‘Practical’ definitions of PC include descriptive accounts of its actual practice. ‘Theoretical’ definitions exclude such accounts. ‘Monistic definitions’ refers to definitions of PC that define it in terms of the work of one specific philosopher or (...) approach in philosophy. ‘Pluralistic’ definitions draw on the work of a variety of philosophers or approaches. ‘Substantive’ definitions are definitions that purport to say what PC is, while ‘antinomous’ definitions of PC say what it is not . My aim is not to define PC definitively. The aim of this article is rather to: (i) provide an overview of the wide variety of efforts to define PC; and, (ii) briefly suggest a preliminary understanding of PC that seems to cover most of the other definitions thereof. For David Fourie (1946-2013). (shrink)

Die öffentliche Diskussion um die „personalisierte Medizin“ legt nahe, dass mit diesem medizinischen Ansatz hohe Erwartungen an einen Beitrag zur klinischen Versorgung verbunden werden. Über die Wahrnehmungen und Bewertungen klinisch tätiger Ärzte ist jedoch wenig bekannt. Die vorliegende qualitative Interviewstudie gibt einen Einblick bezüglich des Einflusses „personalisierter Medizin“ auf die klinische Praxis aus ärztlicher Perspektive. Die Ärzte im vorliegenden Sample nehmen „personalisierte Medizin“ zwar als einen medizinischen Fortschritt wahr, sehen allerdings keine grundsätzliche Veränderung der bisherigen medizinischen Praxis. Als zentrales Problem (...) wird die Handhabung und Verwertung von molekulargenetischen Informationen für Diagnose und Therapie in der klinischen Praxis thematisiert. In Anbetracht der Ergebnisse muss infrage gestellt werden, ob „personalisierte Medizin“ nicht das Gegenteil von dem, was ihr Name nahe legt – eine personenorientiertere Medizin – bewirkt. Die Strategien im Umgang mit den Informationsmassen produzieren selbst neue Herausforderungen, die ein Hindernis für eine personenorientierte Medizin darstellen könnten. (shrink)

Seit der frühen Aufklärung sind der Philosophie ihre außereuropäischen Traditionen zum Faszinosum geworden - aber auch zu einem historiographischen Problem. Denn sie mussten aus der Fülle der überlieferten Kenntnisse und Dokumente erst konstruiert werden. In diese Zeit fällt die Erfindung der Unterscheidungen von 'orientalischer', 'jüdischer' und 'abendländischer' Philosophie. 'Orientalismus' ist daher kein Streitbegriff postkolonialer Kulturwissenschaften, sondern stammt bereits aus den Kontroversen der Aufklärung, deren Philosophiegeschichtsschreibung das jüdische Denken als Schnittfläche orientalischer und europäischer Denkweisen begreift. Dabei rückt zunehmend eine Unterscheidung in (...) den Blick, die auf den jüdischen Platoniker Philo von Alexandrien zurückgeführt wird: die Differenz zwischen Gott und Logos, zwischen Substanz und Subjekt, zwischen Prinzip und Person im Absoluten selbst. (shrink)

The importance of digital technologies for social and economic developments and a growing focus on data collection and privacy concerns have made the Internet a salient and visible issue in global politics. Recent developments have increased the awareness that the current approach of governments and business to the governance of the Internet and the adjacent technological spaces raises a host of ethical issues. The significance and challenges of the digital age have been further accentuated by a string of highly exposed (...) cases of surveillance and a growing concern about issues of privacy and the power of this new industry. This special issue explores what some have referred to as the “Internet-industrial complex”—the intersections between business, states, and other actors in the shaping, development, and governance of the Internet. (shrink)

By way of their genre, inaugural lectures are condensed and rather broad since they are addressed to a mixed audience. The following theses develop and defend my thoughts on the ‘justified religiou...

In the context of some criticism about social responsibility education in business schools, the paper reports findings from a survey of CSR education (teaching and research) in Europe. It analyses the extent of CSR education, the different ways in which it is defined and the levels at which it is taught. The paper provides an account of the efforts that are being made to mainstream CSR teaching and of the teaching methods deployed. It considers drivers of CSR courses, particularly the (...) historical role of motivated individuals and the anticipation of future success being dependent on more institutional drivers. Finally it considers main developments in CSR research both by business school faculty and PhD students, tomorrow''s researchers and the resources devoted to CSR research. The conclusion includes questions that arise and further research directions. (shrink)

People undergo many idiosyncratic experiences throughout their lives that may contribute to individual differences in the size and structure of their knowledge representations. Ultimately, these can have important implications for individuals' cognitive performance. We review evidence that suggests a relationship between individual experiences, the size and structure of semantic representations, as well as individual and age differences in cognitive performance. We conclude that the extent to which experience-dependent changes in semantic representations contribute to individual differences in cognitive aging remains unclear. (...) To help fill this gap, we outline an empirical agenda that utilizes network analysis and involves the concurrent assessment of large-scale semantic networks and cognitive performance in younger and older adults. We present preliminary data to establish the feasibility and limitations of such empirical, network-analytical approaches. (shrink)

ABSTRACT:This article assesses the proliferation of international accountability standards (IAS) in the recent past. We provide a comprehensive overview about the different types of standards and discuss their role as part of a new institutional infrastructure for corporate responsibility. Based on this, it is argued that IAS can advance corporate responsibility on a global level because they contribute to the closure of some omnipresent governance gaps. IAS also improve the preparedness of an organization to give an explanation and a justification (...) to relevant stakeholders for its judgments, intentions, acts and omissions when appropriately called upon to do so. However, IAS also face a variety of problems impeding their potential to help address social and environmental issues. The contribution of the four articles in this special section is discussed in the context of standards’ problems and opportunities. The article closes by outlining a research agenda to further develop and extend the scholarly debate around IAS. (shrink)

This paper investigates the impact of personal attributes and organizational conditions on attitudes toward corporate misdeeds. On the basis of social cognitive theory, we develop hypotheses that are tested against data collected from 215 German employees using an online survey. Our findings suggest that personal attributes have a much greater impact on ethical attitudes than organizational conditions. Further, a moderating effect of control-oriented culture on the relationship between personality traits and attitudes toward corporate misdeeds is found. We derive implications for (...) human resource management and further theory development. (shrink)

We critically assess integrative social contracts theory (ISCT) and show that the concept particularly lacks of moral justification of substantive hypernorms. By drawing on Habermasian philosophy, in particular discourse ethics and its recent application in the theory of deliberative democracy , we further advance ISCT and show that social contracting in business ethics requires a well-justified procedural rather than a substantive focus for managing stakeholder relations. We also replace the monological concept of hypothetical thought experiments in ISCT by a concept (...) of practical discourse to better govern business activities on the macro-level of organizational actors such as firms, governments, and NGOs. (shrink)

Jonathan Wolff is Professor of Philosophy at University College London. He is the author of Robert Nozick (1991), An Introduction to Political Philosophy (1996) and Why Read Marx Today (2002). He is currently working on a number of topics at the intersection of political philosophy and public policy.